New Al Qaeda Leader Linked to Daniel Pearl's Murder

The terrorist chosen to become the interim leader of the international Al Qaeda network was linked to the murder of Jewish reporter Daniel Pearl.

By Chana Ya'ar

First Publish: 5/23/2011, 9:18 PM / Last Update: 5/23/2011, 10:27 PM

Danielpearl.org

The Egyptian chosen to become the interim chief of the international Al Qaeda terrorist organization has been linked to the murder of Jewish Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.

U.S. investigators from the Pearl Project reported that Saif al-Adel had discussed the abduction of the journalist with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

Mohammed, whom the investigators' report refers to by the initials "KSM," was the alleged mastermind behind four simultaneous Al Qaeda terror attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001 – against the two World Trade Center towers in New York, the Pentagon and a failed attempt on the White House that ended with an airline crash in an open field in Pennsylvania instead.

Daniel Pearl was kidnapped in the Pakistani city of Karachi in January 2002 while researching a story on Muslim terrorists. He was later beheaded by Al Qaeda terrorists, and the video was sent to Western media as a warning to the world.

“KSM told the FBI that he was pulled into the kidnapping by a high-level leader in Al Qaeda circles, an Egyptian named Saif al-Adel, who told him to make the kidnapping an Al Qaeda operation,” said the investigators in their report. Pearl was kidnapped by Pakistani terrorists, according to the report's authors.

Mohammed, arrested in Pakistan in 2003 and later taken to the U.S. prison on Guantanamo, later confessed to having beheaded the journalist, Reuters reported.